"It is a book not received into the canon by the learned. It depends purely on the credit of one Van Sparr, that tells a blind story of his finding it in the ruins of an old house, many years after Luther and Aurifaber, the pretended compiler, were dead; but should it be genuine, yet no fair adversary would urge loose table talk against a man in controversy, and build serious inferences upon what perhaps was spoken but in jest. It may serve to divert a reader, but is not fit to convince him."

CHAPTER XXVI.

The War of Smalkald-Elector of Saxony deposed, and Maurice advanced in his room-Conduct of John Frederick in Captivity-The Interim established-Conduct of Melanc thon.

Ir will easily be conceived how melancholy an impression would be made upon all peaceable and pious minds by the event of the 24th of July, 1546, when the diet of Ratisbon broke up, and both parties openly prepared for war.* It is interesting to be allowed to contemplate that impression, softened and alleviated by a devout resignation, as it is exhibited in the following letter of Melancthon to his friend Camerarius, dated only four days after:

"I thank you for repeatedly endeavouring to abate my sadness by your letters; particularly because I see, that in doing this you endeavour to rise above your own distress, by means of the consolations which God has provided for us. I must confess, that under our common calamity, the thought of your affliction often increases my own: but I entreat you, continue to support yourself with these consolations. Sooth your mind also in the society of your excellent wife and your sweet children.-Ah, but you will say, When I look upon them it does but aggravate my anxiety.-True, it must do so sometimes. Yet consider that God makes

*For the details of the Smalkaldic war, the reader is referred to Robertson's Charles V., books viii, and ix.

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the families of his servants the objects of his care, even amid the ruin of empires.-The present is not the first commencement of my painful feelings, or of my conviction that we should have to suffer oppression. Long since, as you well know, I have been deeply affected by observing, not only the fury of our enemies, but the vices and sins of our own people. Though, therefore, my feelings are more acute in this crisis of the calamity, yet, as in the case of diseases of long continuance, I have become in some degree prepared for it: and, while I revolve with myself all that is urged concerning the causes of the war, the characters and views of the leaders, the probable conduct of the military enterprises, their result, and what may be the event of the whole, I rest in the sentence of Gamaliel, If this counsel or this work be of men, it will come to naught; but, if it be of God, ye cannot overthrow it' and with earnest sighs and prayers I seek a salutary issue for the church of God. With my own private danger I am not much affected. Should I lose my life, and thus afford some little triumph to them that rejoice in iniquity (whose number, alas, is great on every side), their triumphing will be short. In such circumstances conscious uprightness is a great support.Some, I trust, have been enlightened by means of our instructions-which would have been more unexceptionable, but for the confusions of the times.-I have thus written briefly to you, to relieve your anxiety for me... Events, we may be assured, will be different from what either one party or the other anticipates."

Melancthon had, no doubt, numbers throughout reformed Germany to sympathize with him in these pious sentiments, and in his sighs and prayers for the church, which, as his numerous epistles testify, he was never weary of offering: and such persons were the true "chariots and horsemen❞ of their Israel, who did more for the cause in which they were embarked, than the troops of the elector and the landgrave could effect; and who, when the latter were defeated and dispersed, still availed to bring about happy events, "different from what had been anticipated by either party."

The actual commencement of hostilities on the part of the emperor was an event calculated to try the principle and steadiness of all professed Protestants and accordingly, while it displayed the firmness of the Elector of Sax

ony and many chief members of the league, it detected the weakness of some and the wickedness of others who still avowed attachment to the Protestant cause. The emperor's protestations, that he made not war on account of religion, but only to put down insubordination and to punish rebellion, imposed upon some; and furnished to others, who ought, upon every principle of honour and religion, to have appeared on the other side, a pretext for attaching themselves to him. Among those who weakly took part with the emperor we may reckon John of Brandenburg, Eric of Brunswick, and George of Mecklenburg. Ulric of Würtemburg and the city of Frankfort were also, at an early period, so far overawed as to join them; while Joachim Elector of Brandenburg, and Frederic Elector Palatine professed to stand neuter; and Maurice of Saxony having, with deliberate and too successful villany, formed the plan of possessing himself, by means of these troubles, of the dominions and dignities of the elector, avowed his reliance on the emperor's word for the safety of religion, and secretly entered into a treaty to support him in the contest. In the Archbishop of Cologne, an aged ecclesiastic, who, though a sincere Protestant, had never joined the league, and was now also under sentence of deposition for his religion, the observance of neutrality, in obedience to the emperor's command, might well be excused. On the other part, besides the Elector of Saxony and the Landgrave of Hesse, with the brother and the eldest son of the former, Philip Duke of Brunswick, Calenburg and his four sons, Francis Duke of Lunenburg, Wolfgang Prince of Anhalt, Christopher Count Henneberg,† and Albert Count Mansfeldt, openly ranged themselves. The city of Strasburg also did itself immortal honour by the part it acted, both at the commencement of the war and after its conclusion. it, in common with the other free cities in the Protestant interest, the emperor addressed an insidious letter, professing to separate their cause from that of the princes of the same persuasion; representing that there existed a conspiracy against their liberties and those of Germany; and exhorting them to join him in putting down those traitorous persons who were their common enemies. The senate re

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plied, in dutiful but decided terms, advocating the cause of the reformation, asserting the fidelity of the princes (of which the emperor, they said, had had large experience in the wars against the Turks), and insisting that he had been taught to think injuriously of them by the pope and his adherents, who were the real authors of the present counsels; and imploring him to pause and reflect before he involved Germany in all the horrors of civil war.

After all the artifice practised and the secret preparations made by the emperor, the zeal of the Protestants, when they saw war to be inevitable, anticipated him. They were first ready, and in great force (amounting to 70,000 foot and 15,000 horse), to take the field; and had it not been for the hesitation with which men, and especially conscientious men, strike the first blow in a civil war, it seems not improbable that they might have stormed his camp at Ingoldstadt, and dispersed his half-collected army at the very outset. Before this, also, Schertel, a soldier of fortune, and an ancestor of the historian Seckendorf, at the head of some troops raised by the city of Augsburg, had the prospect of cutting off, at Inspruck, the pope's forces on their way to join the emperor; but he was timidly or injudiciously recalled by the elector and the landgrave.

These were only specimens of the manner in which the whole of the war was misconducted, in great measure in consequence of that divided and co-ordinate authority vested in two chiefs, and those of such different characters, which has ever been found fatal to military operations. The great object pursued by the emperor was, to decline a battle, and by wearying out the patience of the confederates to induce them to separate; when his victory over each in succession would be sure. And in this design he eventually succeeded by the aid of Maurice.

When the elector quitted his own country to join the confederates, he committed his dominions to the protection of that prince his next neighbour and his near › relative, who had received great obligations from him, and professed, in common with himself, a zeal for the Protestant faith ; and Maurice, who had concealed his engagements to the emperor, with an artful appearance of friendship, undertook the charge. No sooner, however, had the emperor informally and illegally put the elector and the landgrave to the

ban of the empire, than he sent Maurice a copy of his decree, and required him, on pain of incurring similar penalties, to seize and retain in his hands the forfeited estates of the elector; and Maurice, with whom it is probable the whole matter had been previously concerted, did not scruple, after some formalities observed for a decent show of reluctance, to march into his kinsman's territories, and, with aid received from Ferdinand King of the Romans, to attack and defeat his troops, and to take all things under his own administration.

This diversion had the desired effect. The elector, indignant at such treachery, and afflicted at the accounts which he received of the sufferings endured by his subjects from licentious Hungarian soldiers, accustomed to the merciless modes of warfare practised against the Turks, became impatient to return home. In consequence, about the end of the year, the army of the confederates divided, and the greater part returned into their own countries under their respective leaders. The elector, indeed, succeeded in immediately rescuing his territories from the invaders, and in stripping Maurice for a time of nearly all his own dominions; but the separation of the army was the ruin of the cause. The emperor availed himself to the utmost of the advantage given him, and, with the exception of the elector and the landgrave, almost all the Protestant princes and states were compelled to submit, to implore pardon in the most humiliating manner, and to pay heavy fines for the part they had taken. They were not allowed to make any stipulation with regard to their religion: indeed, the subject was not permitted to be mentioned-in order to keep up the emperor's pretence, that the war, on his part, had no religious object.

On this painful occasion Melancthon writes to Cruciger, February 13, 1547: "At a time when our leaders had one of the most glorious causes that the history of the world presents, and when the eyes of all Europe were fixed upon them, how lamentably have they disgraced themselves! But by these examples God admonishes us to look for heavenly succour. In the confidence of obtaining it, let us bear our calamities with patience."

Various circumstances for a time restrained the emperor from marching into Saxony, but in the following spring